What is Fulfillment Service and How Can Startups Benefit From It?

Feb 28, 2018

What is fulfillment services? If you're a startup, you can benefit from this service in more ways than one.

If you're not asking yourself that question yet, you need to start. Be it selling products via a newly built website or a brick and mortar location, your business needs to grow to be successful, and as your business grows, you'll probably grow out of your means.

You may get more orders than you can handle, and you may not be able to keep up with the demand.

If this happens, you need to ask yourself the questions, "What is fulfillment service?"

Take a look at this complete guide that will tell you how a fulfillment service can help your business.

What Is Fulfillment Service and How Can It Help Me?

When your business gets to that point, you need to find a way you can get your products out efficiently but still spend your time on what you really should be doing, which is growing your business.

A fulfillment service is your answer.

They will store, process, and ship your products for you, no matter where your customers are. All you have to do is send them your products, and they'll take care of the rest.

But before you can do that, you need to pick a fulfillment service you can trust with your products. After all, your products and delivery time are a few big pieces of your brand. Any fulfillment service you choose has to work directly with your personalized needs.

How Do I Know If I Need a Fulfillment Service?

As previously mentioned, if processing order forms, preparing packages, and shipping products are taking your attention away from really running and growing your business, they're taking up too much time. You need to pass those tasks on to someone else so you can get back to your work.

But here are some other signs you should work with a fulfillment service:

You're running out of space to store your products.

You don't have the right technology to properly handle the increase in sales.

Your sold products have to sit in a queue and wait to be delivered to customers.

You simply don't have enough manpower to handle all the orders.

Once you get to this point in your business, you have to change what you're doing so your customers receive what they've ordered in a safe and timely manner.

How Do I Find the Right Fulfillment Service?

Spend some time "shopping around" before you pick a fulfillment service. You'll want to make sure the service is reputable and able to handle your individual needs.

It may be helpful to have a conversation with services you're thinking about using. Ask them about their services and policies, and double check they will be able to make the kinds of deliveries you need. For example, if you ship products to different countries, make sure this is a service they can provide.

See if you can talk to past or current clients and ask about their experience. The fulfillment service should be able to provide referrals if you request them.

If a fulfillment service doesn't seem like it will fit well with your company, don't settle. Just go find another service that can do what you need.

What is Fulfillment Service: What Services Does It Actually Provide?

Once your product reaches the fulfillment service, you shouldn't have to think about it again. (This doesn't mean you should completely ignore what happens with the fulfillment service, but it does mean the shipment of your products shouldn't be at the top of your mind every day.)

A fulfillment service should completely handle the processing, packaging, and shipping of your products. But let's take a closer look at what all that means.

Receiving

When you send your products to the fulfillment service, their first step is to make sure they receive everything you sent.

They will count your products to make sure everything arrived and that they have the same number listed on the shipment. They will also inspect the items to find out if they have been damaged. This is an important step because you don't want damaged products getting sent to your customers later.

If your products don't already have them, they will also apply the appropriate barcodes so they can keep track of your products.

Storage

After the services counts and checks the items, they will put your products into storage. This is where the items will sit until they're sold.

Most likely, each kind of product will get their own storage bin so the service can find, package, and ship them quickly when the time comes. They will store products that sell the most closer to the packaging station so they can process them easily.

If all your products don't fit in the storage bin, the service will store the overflow securely in another area of the warehouse and move them to the bin when there is more space.

Processing

Once a customer makes an order, the right products will be picked up and sent to the packaging station. The service will find the best kind of packaging for your product and send the order through a few quality control checks.

Shipping

After this, the order is ready to be shipped and gets prepared for delivery. The service will also choose the best shipping method for the order. Unless your products have a lot of specific requirements, this isn't a hard process.

Most orders are sent through typical delivery methods like the U.S. Postal Service.

Returns

If a customer returns an item to the warehouse, the service will process the item accordingly. This may vary depending on the service you choose, so talk about returns with them before you make a final fulfillment service decision.

What Is Fulfillment Service? It's What Your Business Really Needs

Having a fulfillment service handle all your orders and deliveries for you can clear up a lot of your time. Your team can get back to the jobs you hired them for, and you can get back to running your business.

Are you ready to switch over to a fulfillment service? Contact us and we will take the worry and work off your hands.